Poulsbo and the state of Washington are trying to answer the $64 question (multiplied by 140,625) as they try to comprehend exactly how $9 million was on spent on preliminary work for a project that was estimated to cost $11.4 million.

Widening work along State Route 305 will likely be delayed as a result of these upfront costs — along with the lowest bid coming in a tad high. If $3.5 million, roughly 30 percent of the anticipated construction expense, can be considered a tad.

The long-awaited proposal to move the city’s traffic woes from the highway to its arterials and side streets, it seems, will have to wait a little longer as elected officials search for loose change in the Capitol sofas. The cushions in Olympia are deep, but the city isn’t the only one running its fingers through their confines.

On the traffic side, long waits and the feeling of confinement are nothing new to motorists on 305. But anyone with an iota of driving sense can see that while two new lanes will open up the state route for through traffic, motorists trying to get onto it might as well plan on bringing a good book along with them as an entertaining aside to the red sea of brake lights they’ll swim through daily.

It is difficult as it is getting onto SR 305 from the western approaches — many of which will be cut in an effort to streamline highway travel — but pushing all motorists onto the already congested Hostmark, Iverson and Liberty roads doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. Disagree? Get on 7th or 8th avenues at rush hour and see how long it takes to reach the highway, or even to be let onto one of the feeder roads.

Iverson, which gets traffic from all ends, is an engineering nightmare that will only worsen in its severity when improvements are made on 305. Motorists know Hostmark all too well, both up and down the hill as being its own monster and those trying to cut down past Poulsbo Village via 7th to Liberty have their own traffic beast to battle.

On the plus side, think of all the good reading you’ll get done. Now where were we? Ah yes, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times …”